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LA Galaxy Postgame Notes and Quotes: LA Galaxy 0, Portland Timbers 3 - Saturday, May 22, 2021

May 22, 2021 - Major League Soccer (MLS)
LA Galaxy News Release


Scoring Summary:

POR - Felipe Mora (Assisted by Jose Van Rankin) 47'

POR - Felipe Mora 60'

POR - Diego Valeri (penalty) 69'

Misconduct Summary:

LA - Derrick Williams (red card) 44'

Lineups:

LA Galaxy: Jonathan Bond; Julian Araujo, Daniel Steres, Derrick Williams, Jorge Villafana; Jonathan dos Santos © (Cameron Dunbar 80'), Sebastian Lletget (Adam Saldana 80'); Samuel Grandsir (Sacha Kljestan 40'), Efrain Alvarez (Nick DePuy 46'), Kevin Cabral (Ethan Zubak 69'); Javier Hernandez.

Substitutions: Jonathan Klinsmann, Danilo Acosta, Oniel Fisher, Carlos Harvey.

TOTAL SHOTS: 14; SHOTS ON GOAL: 3; FOULS: 8; OFFSIDE: 0; CORNER KICKS: 6; SAVES: 6.

Head Coach: Greg Vanney

Portland Timbers: Logan Ketterer; Jose Van Rankin, Bill Tuiloma, Dario Zuparic, Claudio Bravo; Eryk Williamson, Yimmi Chara (Renzo Jose Zambrano 72'); Dairon Asprilla (Marvin Loria 46'), Diego Valeri (Zac McGraw 81'), Jeremy Ebobisse (Blake Bodily 81'); Andy Polo (Felipe Mora 45'+3).

Substitutions not used: Hunter Sulte, Pablo Bonilla.

TOTAL SHOTS: 20; SHOTS ON GOAL: 9; FOULS: 8; OFFSIDE: 4; CORNER KICKS: 2; SAVES: 2.

Head Coach: Giovanni Savarese

Referee: Alan Kelly

Ast. Referee 1: Cameron Blanchard

Ast. Referee 2: Jeremy Hanson

Fourth official: Baldomero Toledo

VAR: Malik Badawi

Ast. VAR: Joshua Patlak

NOTES:

The LA Galaxy fell to the Portland Timbers Saturday afternoon on the road at Providence Park.

With the result, the Galaxy are now 4-2-0 (12 points) in the 2021 MLS regular season, with 10 goals scored and 11 conceded.

On the road this year, the Galaxy are now 1-2-0.

LA Galaxy winger Kevin Cabral made his first start as a member of the LA Galaxy.

Cabral made his debut during last weekend's 2-0 win over Austin.

The following players have started every match this season for the Galaxy: Jonathan Bond, Daniel Steres, Jorge Villafana, Jonathan dos Santos, Samuel Grandsir and Javier Hernandez.

In all, the club had seven players feature during Sunday's match that came through the club's developmental system (LA Galaxy II and LA Galaxy Academy): Daniel Steres, Nick DePuy, Julian Araujo, Efrain Alvarez, Cameron Dunbar, Adam Saldana, Ethan Zubak.

In their next match, the LA Galaxy return home to Dignity Health Sports Park to host the San Jose Earthquakes on Saturday, May 29.

For more information, visit www.lagalaxy.com.

Postgame Quotes

LA GALAXY HEAD COACH GREG VANNEY

On today's game:

"I thought in the first half, we were okay. I didn't feel like we were in a position to lose the game. Obviously, they were sitting a little bit and playing us on the counter. I thought our problems were really of our own making in the first half. It was too much possession for the sake of possession and not enough organizing our attacks and trying to finish attacks and attack the opposition. So because we were so, in a way, passive with our possession, we were playing into the hands of a counter attacking team, I thought that became a little bit of our problem. The ball was too slow, losing balls in between the lines and then they would try and counter attack out of that and they had some moments in that. I was hoping we can get to half time because I felt the adjustment and the conversation that we needed to have as a group would really help us moving into the second half and then the tackle happens and the game changes and it's flipped on its head immediately."

On the Derrick Williams tackle:

"It's a tackle that is going to be a red card every single time. For Derrick, it is almost a delayed reaction and that he probably should have read the play a little bit earlier and been a little bit tighter and could have dealt with it in a different way. Then he saw it happen and was just so committed to the challenge at that point that it just became an amount of force that is just never going to be okay, whether it is this league or any other league. It just becomes a challenge that is going to be a red card every time. There were no concerns of a concussion, he was fine in terms of that side of things and even now he is fine."

On the team's second half performance:

"We wanted to start of the second half with a little bit more of a 4-3-2 just to be able to relieve ourselves of some pressure. We were talking about how we wanted to protect our goal and the first goal in the in first couple of minutes we get ourselves very separated, we are not protecting the front of the goal, they cross the ball and we give a up a goal very early which changes the vision of the game because now you are playing from behind and down a man. At that point we didn't just want to go into a bunker either, it was really about an exercise of can we manage things and can we protect ourselves and can we play out of the pressure and into those two guys. We had a couple of runs at it but again nothing sustained overly and the goals come. I haven't seen the replay, I was a little bit baffled by the penalty kick goal. I felt like, as I recall it, the ball deflected off of [Diego] Valeri and was in front of him by about three or four yards. I'd have to see it again, but that was a little bit confusing to me in trying to understand. Maybe I'll get it when I look at it on replay but that is beside the point in the end we have a lot of lessons to take out of that. We've already talked about it as a team after and I think the response of the guys is going to be as good as it was last time. There are a lot of things that we have to take away if we want to get to where we want to get to."

LA GALAXY MIDFIELDER SEBASTIAN LLETGET

On today's game and what they can take away:

"Obviously it's a disappointing result. I thought in the first half, we had the ball a lot and that's obviously the style we want to play, and we want to be threatening and we just didn't threaten their backline enough. We didn't create the types of opportunities that we are trying to build and trying to finish attacks and that just didn't happen, so that was just a little bit frustrating. To finish the first half with a red card, it's unfortunate. Once you go down a man, especially against Portland in Portland, it's going to be a tough game. So very unfortunate. But I'd rather have these types of games now and learn from it and I think there are a lot of things we can look back on and think, we need to do better there. So I'd rather have that happen now than later."

On Greg's message to team:

"Obviously we need to bounce back and learn from this and learn from this. There's a lot of things tactically that we want to get right and we go into games wanting to do and we just didn't execute them the fashion that we wanted to, especially in the first half when we had 11 men. So that was disappointing from us, if you just look at just at us and not the opponent or what they did, but what we did to ourselves. And maybe it's things that people don't even notice, but it's just things that we want to do. But I thought [Greg] was positive and just reinforcing to have this happen now than later."

On what was challenging in the match:

"I think it's a game of two halves. I think in the first half, we probably lacked a little bit of creativity. It's Kevin [Cabral's] first game, so we're obviously integrating another new player, which is obviously tough on him as well, so you need time with that. Second half, you know you're going 45 minutes plus down a man. This is an experienced Portland team - I have played Portland many times - and they are always a mature team. They know what they're doing and, although I thought in the first half they didn't create much and I thought we did dominate a lot of the times, but again, when you're down a man [in second half], it's very tough."

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